Customer service representatives (CSRs) play an important role in working with customers on a one-on-one basis to answer customer questions and address concerns. Companies often employ CSRs to work at company stores, but may also employ CSRs to be available via the phone to speak with customers. When the volume of calls to the company is great enough, the company may utilize a call center to receive and process the incoming calls.
Call centers include a number of CSRs that are available at given times to assist customers. Customers initiate a call to a call center by dialing a customer service number provided by a company. Once connected, the customer is presented with one or more menus or prompts that require the customer to enter information so that the customer can be routed to a CSR. The process of going through the menus can be time consuming. Moreover, once through the menus, the customer may still be asked to wait on the phone until a CSR is available. This process can be time consuming and tedious for the customer.
Efforts have been made to improve the customer's experience when interacting with CSRs at call centers by, for example, hiring additional CSRs and employing CSRs throughout the world so that customers can receive assistance at all hours of the day. Still other attempts have focused on allowing customers to bypass menus and be directly connected to an agent. For example, a customer could say a keyword or phrase, such as “agent” or “representative,” or could press a certain sequence of buttons on the phone (e.g., “*”, “0”, “#”), which connect the customer to an agent. Embodiments described herein may help to reduce the amount of time that customers are required to wait on the phone until a CSR is available.